Business PM vs. Technology PM: The Battle Continues

Andy Jordan is President of Roffensian Consulting S.A., a Roatan, Honduras-based management consulting firm with a comprehensive project management practice. Andy always appreciates feedback and discussion on the issues raised in his articles and can be reached at [email protected]. Andy's new book Risk Management for Project Driven Organizations is now available.

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Without any doubt, the question that I have been asked the most over the many years that I have been involved with project management is around what type of project manager an organization should have, with the options broadly being grouped into two camps--those that feel that a PM needs to have the project management and soft skills that enable them to be strong “pure” project managers who can apply those skills into any environment; and those that feel that you can sacrifice some of those skills in favor of a PM who understands the work that is being performed--a PM for a software development project who understands (and has likely been involved in) software architecture, design and coding.

In previous articles, I have said that I don’t think that there will ever be a simple resolution to the debate, with pros and cons on both sides. My belief hasn’t changed. However, I recently heard a whole new set of arguments for both sides that I think are worth exploring. The discussion was between two fairly young project managers involved in software development projects. They likely didn’t even realize that their discussion was just the latest round in a never-ending debate, but it brought up some interesting points.

The technology-focused PM
The software developer-turned-PM made the point that it was more important than ever to have someone…

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